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Some Minnesota restaurants open up patios, while others hold back for now

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Customers enjoy the patio outside Legends Bar & Grill in Moorhead on Saturday, June 6. Tanner Robinson / WDAY

MOORHEAD — By the time June 1 hit, Legends Bar and Grill in south Moorhead was itching to see customers come through again to enjoy food and drinks.

Staff members say they realized how much people missed being there from Day One of reopening.

"Our patio was packed, so we've had really good turnout" said Baylee Engquist, who works as a server at Legends. "Our lunches and dinners and stuff, we've had a lot of people here."

Based on the turnout from the first few days of being open again, Legends made its space wider, as the patio now bleeds into the parking lot.

"Our patio was just limited to three tables (before), so we were super lucky we were able to expand a little bit," Engquist said.

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On the other side of town, Junkyard Brewing Company is still doing off-sale only, and owner Aaron Juhnke said even though he'd love to have his patio open, the risk of spreading coronavirus is still too great at this time.

"We just don't feel that we can provide the same type of experience that we're known for under these new guidelines," he said.

Despite not being open for on-sale business yet, Juhnke said off-sale business has been enough for all of his staff to still be on board, and he's still keeping on top of reopening plans.

Juhnke is targeting an opening for later this month, but he's waiting until the state, his staff and the Moorhead community feel the safest.

"The speed with which (the state is) releasing new dates for updates on the guidelines is optimistic, but at the same time, you never know what's going to happen," he said.

Gov. Tim Walz announced Friday, June 5, that restaurants can open to dine-in customers at 50% capacity as early as Wednesday, June 10, which makes both Legends and Junkyard hopeful to see more people come through their doors soon.

"We're just excited to be able to open and get people in and just see the faces again," Engquist said.

Tanner Robinson is a producer for First News on WDAY-TV.

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